


Professor Snape, Happy Birthday. Harry Potter.

by kinky_kneazle



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alcohol, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-26
Updated: 2012-01-26
Packaged: 2017-10-31 20:32:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/348095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kinky_kneazle/pseuds/kinky_kneazle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Severus is sure he'd love his birthday present, if it wasn't for those words written on the gift tag.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Professor Snape, Happy Birthday. Harry Potter.

**Author's Note:**

> With love and thanks to my wonderful betas, freaking_crups and kitty_fic, for comma and hand-holding duties! Written for hp_intoxicated at LJ.

_Professor Snape,  
Happy Birthday.  
Harry Potter._

Severus looked at the bottle that the small tag was attached to. It was a bottle of Ogden's Four-Wings blend. One of the last vintages of Firewhisky made the traditional way – with the magical fire provided by dragons. Two years later the Ministry had banished dragons from the Isle and Ogden's had resorted to wizard-created fire. Which meant that this particular bottle of Firewhisky was smooth, exquisite and horrifically expensive.

_Professor Snape,  
Happy Birthday.  
Harry Potter._

It was not as if this was the first time Potter had sent him a birthday present. The presents had started arriving the winter after the boy had left Hogwarts, eighth year and NEWTS behind him. Scarves, potion supplies, journals, dark chocolates – they all arrived in rough boxes, carried by random owls, or the odd toucan while the boy was travelling and all with the same tag.

_Professor Snape,  
Happy Birthday.  
Harry Potter._

Severus didn't know why it made him so angry. After all, the brat still sent him a gift, through an abortive attempt at Auror training, years of travelling and his return to England. And now Harry was a colleague, and he still sent a present. Severus had never given him anything in return. Still, that tag! Professor Snape. Harry Potter. He clutched the bottle in his hand and considered dashing it against the wall, much like he'd tried to dash a jar of beetle eyes against the boy's head ten years ago. Then he realised that it would be a waste of very good whisky so he sat down and opened it instead.

Three hours and a lot of whisky later and Severus was considering how much of an insult it was to the honour of Four-Wings to drink it straight from the bottle. Not that he was going to stop; since he'd accidentally duplicated his glass, drinking from the bottle was the only option. He didn't actually _remember_ duplicating the glass, and it was a pretty poor conjuration since his hand kept sliding through one of them, but there were definitely two glasses there and had been since he'd downed his fourth – or was it fifth? – drink two hours ago.

There was a knock at his door and Severus glared at it, waiting for it to stop. 

It didn't.

"Go away!" he yelled, but the knocking continued. He knew it wasn't a student – they went to his office – which meant it was probably Minerva. Well, as soon as she saw him drunk, she would leave him alone. He stood and staggered towards the door, but when he flung it open it wasn't Minerva standing there.

It was Potter.

He meant to tell the man to get lost, he really did, but the alcohol spoke instead. "Why don't you call me Severus?" 

"Are you drunk, Professor?" Potter shrunk away from him, nose wrinkling. "You smell like you went for a swim in whisky."

Severus stumbled back to the table, picked up the bottle of Four-Wings and took a swig.

"Is that the bottle I got you for your birthday?" Potter took it from him and looked at the label. "You know, considering how much it cost you could have tried to make it last longer than a night. It's meant to be _savoured_."

"Like you, Potter?" He lurched forward, invading Potter's personal space. "A saviour to be savoured?"

Potter's lips thinned as if he was holding back a laugh. "Professor, maybe you should go to bed."

"Why don’t you call me Severus?"

"You've never given me permission. Why do you call me Potter?"

"Harry's too intimate." Severus lifted a hand and stroked Potter's chin, marvelling at the difference between the soft skin and scratchy stubble. "It makes me hope." 

"Hope for what?"

"You."

 

Harry knew he should step away and walk out the door, but it was too good an opportunity to pass up. He'd dropped in to wish Snape a happy birthday in person, and he had been expecting the same buttoned up Professor that he knew so well. Instead, Severus Snape was messy. There was no other word for it. Messy and amorous, if the way he was draping himself around Harry was any indication.

Still, the look of naked need on Snape's face when he said that single word brought Harry's guilt back. It was one thing to have a giggle at a drunken Snape and perhaps needle him about a hangover the next morning; the man would be mortified if he knew Harry had heard those confessions.

"Come on, Severus," he said, the name bringing a grin to Snape's face. "Let's get you to bed."

"You come, too," Snape said, and Harry felt his eyes widen. "Harry," Snape added and his voice sounded soft and seductive. Harry groaned; he'd wanted to hear Snape call him that for years, and it was only happening because of an overabundance of extremely expensive Firewhisky.

"You're going to regret this in the morning," Harry murmured, lifting Snape's arm over his shoulder and beginning the stumble towards the bedroom.

"Nuh-uh," Snape replied, his hand sliding over Harry's arse. 

Harry took a deep breath and told himself it was the alcohol groping, and he shouldn't read anything into it. "Into bed with you." He pushed Severus towards the mattress and laughed when the man bounced.

"Undress me?"

"Let's just get you out of your shoes, shall we?"

"A lover would take my clothes."

Harry couldn't help but smile at Snape's pouty countenance. "Friends just take shoes," he said as he slipped shoes and socks from the man's feet. He took a moment to stare at the long toes, fighting an urge to press a kiss to them.

"Like being your friend, Harry," Snape murmured. "But want to be more. Wanna have breakfast with you." 

Harry was about to ask how much _more_ Severus was asking for and where breakfast came into it, but a gentle snore told him that he had all the information available tonight.

He bustled around the rooms for a moment and left a second present somewhere where Severus would see it in the morning. Then he traced the stubble on Severus' jaw and quickly walked out before he could be tempted to do more.

 

Severus woke the morning after his birthday with a sore head, queasy stomach, and unsettling memories of the night before. Had Potter dropped in? His verbal diarrhoea came back to him. _Saviour to be savoured_? He wondered how hard it was to hit the man who defeated Voldemort with an _Obliviate_. 

"Wanna have breakfast with you?" he murmured, fighting an urge to throw up. "That was the worst pick-up line ever uttered."

Perhaps he should just _Obliviate_ himself.

He slowly turned his head, breathing deeply as he did so to help stave off the rebellion in his stomach. There was a vial on his bedside table, with a length of ribbon wrapped around it and a tag attached. He ignored the fact it was gift-wrapped and just downed the contents, waiting for the relief only a hangover potion could bring.

Five minutes later he took a closer look at the gift-wrapped vial. He blushed, then smiled. Then he stood to wash the stench of alcohol from his pores. Soon after he walked out the door, an unfamiliar smile on his face.

He left the vial, ribbon and tag on his bed.

_Severus,  
Breakfast is on me.  
Yours, Harry._   



End file.
